Posted in: Comics | Tagged: birmingham, Comics, entertainment, granito, kapow, mcm, rob granito

The British Rob Granito?

Published Sat, 02 Jun 2012 17:00:31 -0500

Last updated Mon, 07 Mar 2016 06:59:12 -0600

Over the last couple of weeks there has been growing irritation, annoyance and indeed anger about an individual who is being dubbed by some as the British Rob Granito.

An unnamed individual exhibiting at a number of British comic conventions, including Birmingham Comics Expo, Kapow and London MCM, who sells prints of copyrighted characters. Nothing unusual in that you may think. But the artwork isn't his. Indeed, it's mostly the work of non-credited creators putting their work on the likes of deviantArt.

This could be a deliberate strategy – publishers can't object, without dooming all the freelance artists who work for them from making an extra buck on their own character prints. And creators feel unable to object as it involves a company's owned characters and might draw a spotlight on their own character approprition.

Of course there is also a few more recognisable prints – the cover to Killing Joke by Brian Bolland here, a Superman piece by Lee Bermejo there, a Yoda promotional piece from Star Wars even, but what is clear is that this individual is using work created by other people for profit, and claiming that it is their own.

Most recently exhibiting in Collectormania, Milton Keynes, after a few confrontations, he now seems to be amending his story, putting up a sign saying that these are not all 100% copyright legit… but I don't think the artists concerned are going to be placated with that.

We have a few examples… do the readers of Bleeding Cool fancy crowdsourcing the origins of all the others?

Thanks to the Tumblr poster Donna Evans for some truly excellent work in this matter.